MILWAUKEE — There was no way to know how Jackson Chourio would handle a record-setting contract for a player who’d never spent a day in the big leagues, or how he’d handle the big leagues at age 20 and 21. For that matter, there was no way to know how he’d handle the pressures of the postseason.
But the scouts who signed him sure tried.
“It’s not surprising me that he is able to handle that kind of pressure,” said Brewers director of international player evaluation Luis Pérez, one of the scouts who signed Chourio for Milwaukee in 2021. “I asked him personally: ‘What do you think when you have to show what you’ve got in that kind of game?’”
The scout loved the answer: “Compete.”
Pérez was on hand at American Family Field on Tuesday to watch Chourio tie the Brewers’ record with his fourth career postseason home run. The 21-year-old star connected on a first-pitch leadoff shot off Dodgers starter Yoshinobu Yamamoto in what became a 5-1 loss in Game 2 of the National League Championship Series.
Chourio’s blast was laced with historic footnotes, but Yamamoto proved too much for Milwaukee to handle in a historic, complete-game performance of his own. In fact, Yamamoto joined Johnny Antonelli (New York Giants, Game 2 of the 1954 World Series) as the only pitcher to allow a leadoff homer and then no other runs while going the distance in a postseason start.
“Of course,” Brewers veteran Christian Yelich said. “That’s a great way to start the night.”
Instead, Yamamoto made it a long night for the Brewers, who never had a runner in scoring position, stranded four baserunners and had 14 consecutive outs to end the game.
“Got punched in the mouth first swing of the game — good swing by him,” Dodgers catcher Will Smith said. “But to get 27 outs after that, that was impressive. What [Yamamoto] did tonight, yeah, that was just domination.”
That Chourio has starred in his pair of postseason berths with the Brewers isn’t surprising to Pérez, he said, because he and assistant director of Latin American scouting Fernando Veracierto did their due diligence when they first met Chourio at age 14. They learned he had been playing for Venezuelan national teams since he was 8 years old, and competing in international tournaments by age 10.
“He showed, always, his talent no matter the pressure,” Pérez said. “In my opinion, that kind of behavior is natural. All the people around him said, ‘That guy has more than talent. He can handle the pressure.’”
In the first inning on Tuesday, Chourio pounced on a first-pitch fastball from Yamamoto, launching it out to right-center field for an opposite-field blast. The stadium was buzzing and Chourio thought the lineup might be on its way to a big night.
“It’s a great feeling to have, for sure,” Chourio said via translator Daniel de Mondesert, “to be able to put your team ahead right away from the first pitch of the game.”
With that leadoff homer, Chourio continued a trend in this postseason, which is nearing the most leadoff shots in playoff history.
Chourio joined Michael Busch (twice) of the Cubs, George Springer of the Blue Jays and Shohei Ohtani of the Dodgers as players with a leadoff homer in these playoffs. The five first-inning shots are tied for the most leadoff home runs in a single postseason (also accomplished in 2007).
Adding more significance to the moment, both Chourio’s shot and Springer’s from Game 1 of the ALCS against Seattle came on the first offering. These two first-pitch leadoff blasts are tied for the most in a single postseason, along with Kyle Schwarber and Jose Altuve tallying one each in 2023 and Chris Young and Jimmy Rollins accomplishing the feat in 2007.
It represented the third leadoff homer in Brewers playoff history, and Chourio already has two of them. He also belted a leadoff shot in Game 2 of the Wild Card Series last year against the Mets. Corey Hart is the other Brewers player on that list after his first-inning homer in Game 6 of the 2011 NLCS against the Cardinals.
Chourio is one of five active players with multiple career leadoff homers in the postseason, joining Schwarber (five), Ohtani (two), Springer (two) and Busch (two). The young Brewers star is the 11th player all time to have multiple leadoff blasts in the playoffs.
And get this: Chourio became the second-youngest player in playoff history with a leadoff home run, doing so on Tuesday night at 21 years and 217 days. The only player ahead of him is … him. His leadoff shot in last year’s playoffs came at 20 years and 205 days. No other player in MLB history has a postseason leadoff homer under the age of 22 years old.
Chourio now has four career home runs in the postseason, putting him into a tie with Prince Fielder and Orlando Arcia for the most in Brewers history. Chourio is also tied with Miguel Cabrera, Bryce Harper, Andruw Jones and Mickey Mantle for the second-most playoff homers before turning 22. Juan Soto boasts that record with five.
The homer also continued Milwaukee’s propensity for first-inning runs in this postseason.
During the NL Division Series against the Cubs, Milwaukee and Chicago combined for a playoff-record 22 runs (any postseason round) in the opening frame. The Brewers have scored 12 in the playoffs, accounting for 50% of their total runs scored (24) this postseason.
Unfortunately for the Brewers, that first-inning breakthrough was all that Yamamoto surrendered in his own postseason masterpiece.
“We were unable to add on to that and to keep going,” Chourio said. “But that [leadoff homer] is a great feeling. It kind of gives the group a breath of fresh air there going into the game, giving us a lead. But we weren’t able to capitalize on it.”
